![Kids Home Alone An empty playground is seen at an apartment complex, Jan. 22, 2015, in Manchester, N.H. where authorities say twin 9-year-old boys were left mostly alone for four months after their parents took three siblings to Nigeria and left an uncle to care for them.](https://api.time.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/manchester-new-hampshire.jpg?quality=85&w=2400)
Twin 9-year-olds were left virtually on their own for four months in a Manchester, N.H. apartment where an uncle would only occasionally check in on them.
The boys’ parents and three siblings left for Nigeria in July with the intention of returning the next month, but were delayed, the Associated Press reports. In the mean time, their 25-year-old uncle, Giobari Atura, was supposed to stay with the boys. Instead, he says he checked in on them every few days.
Police finally became involved in November when the boys’ school alerted them that they’d been living alone, getting themselves up in the morning and taking the bus to eat breakfast and lunch at school. The only edible food found in the apartment was ramen.
The twins were initially placed in foster care, but have now been returned to their parents, who came back to the U.S. shortly after learning of the situation. While Atura was charged with endangering the welfare of a child in December, the parents will not be charged since they left their sons in the care of a relative.
[AP]
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